Delgrès and companions make their last stand at Matouba

Ona Judge left the Philadelphia household of George and Martha Washington to seek freedom. Her escape challenged the power of even the republic’s most prominent family to own people. Self-emancipation...

Revolutionary manifestos appeared in Salvador during the Bahia Conspiracy. Participants included working people and people of African descent, with demands for liberty and an end to discriminatory...

Colonial authorities publicly executed four men involved in the Bahia Conspiracy. The punishment targeted a movement remembered for popular participation and challenges to racial inequality. Their...

Absalom Jones and other free Black petitioners asked Congress to end the international slave trade, move toward emancipation, and protect free people from kidnapping. Their demands connected slavery...

Louis Delgrès confronted arriving French troops and issued a proclamation appealing against oppression. Resistance defended emancipation won during the revolutionary period. The conflict exposed the...

French forces arrested Toussaint Louverture and deported him to France. Removing a major Black leader was part of an effort to reassert imperial control. Resistance continued, demonstrating that the...

Haitian forces defeated the French at Vertières in a decisive battle preceding independence. People who had fought slavery defended their freedom against renewed colonial domination. Their military...

Jean-Jacques Dessalines proclaimed Haiti’s independence after years of collective struggle. Formerly enslaved people had defeated attempts to restore French domination. Independence protected...

Haiti adopted a constitution prohibiting slavery and naming its citizens Black. The declaration challenged colonial color divisions and asserted dignity after independence. This political rejection of...

The Slave Trade Act received royal assent after extensive campaigning. It prohibited British participation in the slave trade, but did not free people already enslaved in British colonies....